Governments often adopt short-term policies that unnecessarily reduce the standard of living of the current generation and also violate their responsibilities to future generations. It is therefore ...
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Governments often adopt short-term policies that unnecessarily reduce the standard of living of the current generation and also violate their responsibilities to future generations. It is therefore important to consider morally legitimate ways of reducing such harmful short-termism. This chapter addresses this problem by identifying the drivers of harmful short-termism. It then proposes five reforms to the policy-making process that respond to these drivers. More specifically, it argues in favour of (i) requiring incoming governments to issue a Manifesto for the Future that outlines their policies for addressing long-term trends; (ii) creating a Committee for the Future, whose role is to scrutinize policies for their long-term impacts; (iii) building into the parliamentary process a regular Visions for the Future day in which the Government’s Manifesto for the Future and its record is scrutinized by the Opposition; (iv) creating an Independent Council for the Future; and (v) employing long-term performance indicators.Less

Political Institutions for the Future : A Fivefold Package

Simon Caney

Published in print: 2016-12-22

Governments often adopt short-term policies that unnecessarily reduce the standard of living of the current generation and also violate their responsibilities to future generations. It is therefore important to consider morally legitimate ways of reducing such harmful short-termism. This chapter addresses this problem by identifying the drivers of harmful short-termism. It then proposes five reforms to the policy-making process that respond to these drivers. More specifically, it argues in favour of (i) requiring incoming governments to issue a Manifesto for the Future that outlines their policies for addressing long-term trends; (ii) creating a Committee for the Future, whose role is to scrutinize policies for their long-term impacts; (iii) building into the parliamentary process a regular Visions for the Future day in which the Government’s Manifesto for the Future and its record is scrutinized by the Opposition; (iv) creating an Independent Council for the Future; and (v) employing long-term performance indicators.